The Captain
by PK Samurai
Summary: [AU] "We'll play baseball together again, one day."
1. The Captain

**The Captain**

* * *

His real name was Sa Eh-joon, but the others on the baseball team called him Eijun, the Japanese rendition of the name he had been born with. Even his parents called him Eijun. Not Eh-joon. Perhaps they were proud for him that he had been accepted into the team. He was the only non-Japanese in it, after all. Or maybe they were simply scared.

His neighbors on the other hand were less proud, less scared. They called him a mutt and a coward. A Japanese-wannabe cowardly mutt. They called him many things. But while it was a small phonetic difference between 'Eh-joon' and 'Eijun,' they never called him 'Eijun.'

He had been born as Eh-joon, but he was known as Eijun on the mound. He had two names, but he was one person. An object can have only one name. So what was his name, then? Was he Eh-joon or Eijun? He didn't know.

The Japanese imperial officer who'd started the baseball team was named Miyuki Kazuya, and he called him Eijun.

* * *

The whole town had been taken aback when the Japanese officer in charge of the police station suddenly died. The whispered rumors were that he'd died of food poisoning, and in the week following his death, green-uniformed Japanese officers combed the town in search of the culprit. It was a grim and fearful week, but eventually, they managed to pin the crime on one of the farmers who delivered potatoes to the station. They publicly executed him in the town square, lopping off his head. Thankfully, the executioner was a talented swordsman of the great imperial Japanese army, so the poor farmer died in an instant. Probably, anyways. They scrubbed and washed the bloody area with cold water afterwards, leaving nothing behind.

After that, things settled down, and a few weeks later, the recently decorated Captain Miyuki Kazuya arrived to take over the position.

It seemed astounding at first that such a young man could have achieved such a high position. He must be the youngest officer to have achieved such a high rank, said his neighbors.

To Eijun, however, it seemed like a punishment. After all, who would want to be sent away to a dead-end post in some random backwater town?

* * *

Several months after the farmer's execution, Eijun was playing catch with his friends after school, when they suddenly froze. Their faces turned pale as they looked at something behind him, and when he turned around with an impatient retort at the tip of his tongue, he saw Captain Miyuki watching them from the gate.

"You there," said the captain in Japanese. He was dressed in the crisp white uniform of an officer, with epaulettes on his shoulders and the patches and medals on his chest denoting his elevated rank. He pointed a straight finger at Eijun, who blanched. "What's your name?"

Eijun knew Japanese, of course. They all did. They spoke Korean at home, but they were taught Japanese in school, and by law, all the signs in their town were in both Japanese and Korean.

"Sa Eh-joon, sir," he mumbled, his heart beginning to pound in his chest. He didn't look away from the officer's gaze because it would seem as if he weren't paying attention. But at the same time, meeting his eyes would be taken as being insolent, so after a moment's panic, he fixed his eyes on the man's chin. Eijun wracked his brain, trying desperately to figure out if he'd done anything to incur his wrath. The way the farmer's head had rolled across the ground flashed through his mind.

What the captain asked him, however, was the last thing that he had been expecting.

"Have you ever played baseball?"

"Y-yes, sir," he said, trying unsuccessfully to hide the tremor in his voice.

Eijun had heard the rumors, of course. Seen some of it for himself, even. Rumors about how cruel and sadistic the Japanese were. How like beasts they were. Mr. Kim who used to live two doors down, had said that his niece had signed a contract, thinking that she would be working in a company in Japan. But instead, she'd found herself locked away in a military brothel, where she was violated by Japanese soldiers every day.

Mr. Kim disappeared a few weeks after that. The official story was that he'd run away from his gambling debts, but Mrs. Park from the drug store muttered that he was probably being experimented on in some secret Japanese military lab.

"I've got a baseball team," said the captain. "And I've been looking for an interesting new pitcher. Come to the field behind the police station tomorrow after you get out of school." He said all this with the manner of those who were used to their commands being unquestioningly carried out to the letter.

"Yes sir," Eijun squeaked. The captain smiled then, and his mind immediately went into overdrive with visions of his being strapped down onto a hospital bed, as a sparking, spinning rusty metal saw came down at his stomach.

_Whirrrr!_

* * *

As Eijun found out the next day, the field was a rough dirt lot that had bases painted in white at each corner. It hadn't been there until Captain Miyuki's arrival at their town.

When Eijun showed up, he was sweating profusely. His teacher had let them out later than usual, and he'd run all the way as fast as his legs could carry him. Eijun wondered if he wasn't running to his death, but he figured that if he were going to die, it'd be better to get it over with.

However, what awaited him at the field was not an executioner with a gleaming sword or a doctor in a blood-stained lab coat. Instead, there were at least a dozen other men there, including the decorated captain Miyuki himself. Some of them were police officers, and others were civilians. But they were all young and Japanese.

They turned in unison to look at Eijun, and he cringed, feeling as if his stomach would drop out through his bottom.

"A Korean?" said a rather vicious-looking one with slicked back hair. "You sure about this, captain?" His name was Kuramochi, Eijun would later learn, and he had a tongue as sharp as his appearance.

"He's our replacement pitcher," said the captain, his eyes gleaming. Eijun noticed that he was wearing some kind of strange visor, and a white baseball uniform instead of his usual military one. "His velocity is at about Jun's level, but he's got an interesting way of throwing. He'll do, until Furuya's wrist gets better."

"What's your name?" asked another boy gently. He was probably the one closest to Eijun in age, though it was hard to judge with half his face covered with hair. His name was Kominato Haruichi, and he would later tell Eijun that he had followed his older enlisted brother (who was also a member of the team) to Korea.

"Eh-joon," he said hesitantly. He hoped they wouldn't ask him for his last name; dimly, he thought that even if he were killed, at the very least, he could protect his parents.

"Eijun?" the other boy repeated, blinking, having misheard him. Eijun opened his mouth to correct him, but the captain let out a sudden laugh.

"Eijun," said Captain Miyuki, with a smile. "That's good. That'll be your name here, while you're our pitcher."

Eijun didn't know what to say. There had been concerned talk among the adults about how a decree might be passed soon forcing Koreans to adopt Japanese surnames, but he'd given it a bare moment's thought. Now, with a single passing remark, the captain had given him the name 'Eijun.' But the captain was a ranked officer used to getting his way, and Eijun was just a random schoolboy he'd picked up at a whim. The captain was Japanese and Eijun was not, and that was all the difference in the world.

When Eijun first went up on the mound, he was – perhaps understandably – terrified. He knew for a fact that his pitches were difficult to time. He'd always had to hold back against his friends. What would these batters do to him if he jammed them – or even worse, struck them out?

A metal saw whirred in the back of his mind as he looked back at the first batter, Kuramochi. He gulped. The vicious-looking man still didn't look convinced about him, a withering glare in his eyes. His heart beating faster, Eijun looked down. It was a mistake, for he then met the captain's eyes. He'd found out to his surprise that Captain Miyuki actually played with them as a catcher. It was not exactly reassuring, knowing that a man who could kill him at a whim was catching for him.

_Gramps_, he thought to himself. _How are you doing in the afterlife? I'm playing baseball with a Japanese imperial officer. He's a captain. Was it a captain who killed you in battle?_

Eijun threw the first pitch, and Kuramochi swung. With a _crack!_, the white ball flew through the air, going straight past the second baseman's glove and making it a base hit. Kuramochi meanwhile threw aside the bat and raced to first base. Eijun's eyes widened at the sight. His legs were a blur. He'd never seen anyone run so fast before in his life.

"_**Safe!**_" said the umpire, and those who were watching from the bench let out an amused titter.

The next batter was Kominato Ryōsuke, Haruichi's older brother. He was a man with what seemed like a permanent smile on his face. His kind were the scariest among Japanese officers, in Eijun's experience. They were the ones you had to watch out for the most, for you could never know what they wanted to hear.

Goosebumps rising on his skin, Eijun threw, and the bat cracked against the ball again, sending it flying all the way to the outfield. Kominato Ryōsuke slid easily to first and Kuramochi advanced to second.

The following batter, a brutal-looking man with a small beard, let out a roar with a swing of his bat, and Kuramochi made it to home base. The other team burst into cheers.

Suddenly, the captain pulled his arm back and threw the ball blazingly hard at Eijun. His eyes widening, he barely managed to catch it in his mitt, wincing at the force behind it. Expressionless, the captain stood up and walked to the mound. The others on their team also joined him.

"You can't switch pitchers, captain!" one of the members of the other team hollered at them gleefully. "You're the one who brought him!"

"Captain," said one of the young police officers nervously. His name was Kanemaru and he was the third baseman for their team.

"Do you know who I am?" said the captain to Eijun, ignoring the others.

"Yes sir," Eijun said, his life flashing before his eyes. "Captain Miyuki."

"Why are you holding back and throwing such weak pitches?" he demanded, and Eijun gulped.

"I'm - I'm not a very good pitcher," he said. "I'm sorry."

"Did you know that lying to an officer of the Japanese Imperial Army is a capital offence?" said the captain.

"Yes sir," Eijun squeaked.

_Whirrr!_, the saw buzzed.

"No more holding back now," he said warningly. Then motioning to the others to return to their positions, he put back on his catcher's mask.

The next hitter hit another single, bringing a runner home, but Eijun retired in quick succession the next third batters.

"Better," said the captain, thumping Eijun on the back as they returned to the bench to change equipment. Eijun froze momentarily at the touch, wondering for a second whether a blade wasn't sticking out of his back now.

The game progressed, and their team was in the lead when the captain ended it at the bottom of the seventh inning.

"Duty calls," he explained, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the police station.

"I can't see his arm when he throws," complained one of the batters for the other team, a square-faced man named Sakai. He put down his bat. "It's not fair."

"Yūki had no trouble hitting them," said the captain, switching his strange visor for a pair of glasses. "So quit complaining."

"That's not a fair comparison," someone else grumbled.

As Eijun hung around anxiously at the edge of the pack, wondering what to do, he heard someone approach him. His heart sunk when he saw that it was Kuramochi; after that first at bat, Eijun had never let him on base again, and he wondered whether he was back for revenge.

But instead, the mean-faced man said, "Eijun was it? You're not a half-bad pitcher." Taken aback, Eijun looked around, wondering if the man had been talking to someone else. "I'm talking to you, idiot."

"Yes sir," he said, not knowing what else to say.

Kuramochi let out a snorting sound, and from in front of them, the captain let out an amused laugh.

* * *

The news that Eijun was now the pitcher for the baseball team spread like wildfire through the town. At first, they were merely curious and wondering.

"What are they like?" his classmates asked, crowding around him at school.

"Are they like us?" his parents asked.

"Shirking their duties and playing baseball," muttered Mrs. Park from the drugstore.

"Some of them could probably be cleanup batters in the pro league. There's one who could be an Olympian runner. And another one has the loudest roar I've ever heard. They're all scary," Eijun reported dutifully, feeling like a spy infiltrating an enemy's ranks. That was probably what the others considered him at the beginning.

At his words, they gave each other uneasy looks.

"So they're that different from us, huh?"

Eijun couldn't say.

* * *

As time passed, his life fell into a strange pattern.

In the morning and during school, he was still Eh-joon. He ate rice and pickled radish at home and then walked to school, where he alternatively looked out the window or slept on his desk in class. He'd used to stay after school to play catch with his friends or go back home and help his parents out on the fields, but now, he ran to the baseball field in the more modern part of the town, where he became Eijun and pitched to a group of Japanese batters.

In many ways, Eijun felt like he was suspended somewhere in between two different worlds. How long would this strange divide last?

The others on the team had long since stopped grumbling about his being on the team. Even when their other pitcher returned, Captain Miyuki told Eijun matter-of-factly that he expected to see him back on the field the next day.

The pitcher was a man named Furuya who threw the fastest and scariest pitches he'd ever seen in his life – another monster among them – and he had been out of commission for a month due to a fractured wrist.

Eijun didn't know how he felt on the mound. At first, he'd been terrified, of course, the metal saw never far from his mind. He'd ran to the baseball field because he'd been scared of what the captain would do to him if he were late.

But lately, he wondered if the pounding in his chest wasn't just from fear, but from something else. He wondered if the reason why he ran quickly – so quickly in fact, that his reflection on the surface of the rice paddies blurred – wasn't out of a desire to get death over with. Maybe it was something else.

"Nice ball," said the captain, throwing the ball back to him.

"Stop grinning," Kuramochi snapped, waving the bat threateningly at Eijun. The first time he had done this, Eijun immediately froze in place, thinking that his time had come. But nothing happened beside Kuramochi marching off the field.

At his next at bat, he hit a single off of Eijun and then stole two more bases.

* * *

The captain was the only one on the team who could consistently catch Eijun's pitches, so as a result, they were always paired together as a battery.

At first, once they'd learned each others' signs, they hadn't talked much. Eijun was a scared high school boy and Captain Miyuki was a celebrated imperial officer. The captain was Japanese and Eijun wasn't, and that was enough of a difference for them not to talk. The captain gave him signs, and Eijun threw for a seven-inning game, and then they each went their separate way. The captain, to the police station. Eijun, to his run-down home at the outskirts of the town.

The first time the captain asked him a question, it was oddly enough about his school.

"What do you learn at school?" he asked one summer day, as they took off their equipment at the bench. It was evening time, but the sun was still high in the sky. Eijun was wondering whether he had enough daylight to drop by the market square before going home, so he answered without thinking.

"Wha?" Eijun said. Captain Miyuki raised an eyebrow at him, and as he suddenly realized what he had just said, he grew pale. The saw buzzed threateningly in his head for the first time in a while. In a weak voice, he tried to fix the damage. "I - I...what do you mean, captain?"

"What are they teaching you at school?"

"Math," he stammered out. "Science. History. Japanese. And...and literature..."

"History? Japanese history?"

"Y-yes sir," said Eijun. "Mostly."

"Hm," the captain smiled. "What do you know about the Japanese empire?"

"It...it's the greatest empire in the world, ruled by his Majesty the Emperor," he answered hastily.

"Very good," said the captain, and with a flash of teeth, he removed his visor for his glasses. He turned away, and Eijun knew that he was dismissed.

It was only after the police station disappeared from view that he allowed himself to relax, slumping against the wall of a building in relief, his heart pounding furiously in his ears.

At this rate, Eijun thought to himself, his heart was going to give out before he'd even turned twenty.

* * *

Nevertheless, for a time, there was peace in the town. Things had settled down since the young captain's appointment there. Though there were some grumbling complaints about Captain Miyuki spending too much time playing baseball and not taking care of his duties, people were in actuality relieved to be left alone.

Things may very well have continued to go on in this way, if a piece of official paper had not suddenly appeared on the town square post, declaring the arrest and imminent execution of Mrs. Park from the drugstore for the crime of being a sympathizer of the Korean independence movement.

Summer was ending and the days had been growing colder and shorter when she was publicly executed by firing squad at the town center. Perhaps the cleaning squad lingered too long before cleaning, or perhaps the blood stained better on cold ground. Or perhaps it was Mrs. Park's last grudging gift to the world.

But even after they'd scrubbed at it with water and soap, a dull, ugly reddish stain remained.

Eijun was there when it happened. He was there to see the woman struggle against her bindings in her last moments. Saw the way the muzzles of the rifles pointed at her gleamed. He was in the same class as her eldest son. He'd used to go over sometimes to buy pain relief patches for his parents. He listened patiently to her grumbling, so she had always slipped an extra patch into the bag.

The captain himself gave the order for the officers to fire, his white uniform almost blindingly bright under the sun.

The next day after school at the baseball field, he smiled proudly at Eijun, telling him, "nice ball."

* * *

A week after Mrs. Park was killed, Eijun found himself surrounded by some of his classmates during lunchtime. At the forefront was Mrs. Park's eldest son.

They asked no questions. It was purely physical. Their faces were twisted sullenly, their jaws clenched. Knuckles were cracked. Eijun felt his nose crack.

Mrs. Park's eldest son was crying when he punched Eijun, and he would have cried too, but he held it back for their sake.

When classes resumed, the teachers avoided looking at his bloodied-up face. His swollen nose wouldn't stop bleeding no matter which way he tilted his head, so after a while, Eijun gave up and left.

He couldn't go back home looking like that, so after some deliberation, he began heading for the public bath, thinking he could bury his face in a wet towel and wait for the swelling to go down. But the public bath was on the other side of town, and just as he passed by the front of the police station, the doors opened and the captain himself stepped out with a ruminating look on his face.

His heart pounding, Eijun immediately began to pick up his pace, but that was the wrong move, as it caught the captain's attention. He looked up, and at first, his eyes slid easily past Eijun's face, clearly not recognizing him – but suddenly, he came to a stop, his gaze refocusing.

"What...?" said Captain Miyuki, looking taken aback. "Eijun? What happened to you?"

"I ran into a door," Eijun lied, hanging his head and trying to look ashamed. It wasn't hard.

"You ran into a door," the captain said slowly.

"Yes sir."

For a moment, he regarded Eijun with an unreadable expression, his mouth thinning. It was clear he didn't believe him.

"I told this to you on the first day," he finally said, "that lying to an officer of the Japanese Imperial Army is a capital offence."

"Yes sir."

The captain gave him a sharp look – and then let out a sigh.

"Come with me," he said, and he took Eijun to the doctor to get stitches.

As the sharp needle pulled painfully through his broken skin, tears came to his eyes, and he sobbed.

* * *

To Eijun's apprehension, the captain started paying closer attention to him after that. Eijun showed up several more times at the field with bruises and cuts on his face. Soon, even the others on the team took notice.

"Are you...okay, Eijun?" Haruichi asked him concernedly.

"I tripped down the stairs," said Eijun, grinning (with his front tooth missing).

"Either you're clumsy, or doors and stairs really love you," the captain remarked dryly.

"I'm going through a growth phase, so I've been running into things," he insisted.

"You must be growing in unmentionable places then, because you look like the exact same height to me," Kuramochi said leeringly, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.

"I have, actually. Thanks for noticing, I didn't realize you were paying such close attention," said Eijun with a straight face. The others laughed as Kuramochi's face twisted into a scowl.

"It's going to be winter soon," said the captain, his laugh fading into the wind as he looked up at the grey sky.

* * *

When it got too cold to play baseball, Captain Miyuki told Eijun that he didn't have to come again until the next year.

This would have relieved him just a few months ago, but for some reason, Eijun felt his heart sink at the news.

"Yes sir," he said obediently, carefully making his face blank.

"Have a happy new year," Haruichi cheerfully called out. The others nodded and waved at him, and Kuramochi gave him a playful kick on the back of his legs.

The way back home was long, and he felt ashamed.

* * *

For the most part, once winter break had started, Eijun stayed home. His parents understood and left him alone. They said nothing to him, but he could tell from their withdrawn and worn out faces that they were also likely suffering the consequences. His father trudged out to the marketplace in the morning with his hitched wagon overflowing with grain, and came back at night with it just as full.

They ate a lot of rice that winter.

* * *

When his father collapsed from exhaustion at the start of the new year, Eijun knew that they were in trouble. Thankfully, one of his parents' remaining friends worked as the head editor of the local town newspaper, and he offered Eijun a job as a delivery boy. He would hand out the paper at the crack of dawn, when there was barely anyone walking the streets, so it was the perfect job for him.

Happy to finally be able to stretch his legs, Eijun eagerly took to the job. He didn't have a bike, but the town was not very big, so he ran every morning, carrying the stacks of newspapers in a knapsack on his back. It was cold, hard work, but he was usually sufficiently warmed up halfway through.

_The captain would be proud if he saw me,_ he thought wryly to himself.

Eijun came to hate snowy days. He'd used to look forward to it when he was younger because it meant snowball fights, and school was closed if it happened during the semester. But now, it meant the ground was extra icy, and his hands grew so numb he feared he would get frostbite. And then they'd really have to saw off his hands.

It was on one such snowy day that, just as he'd thrown a newspaper over the walls of a house, a pair of hands suddenly lunged out from behind him. They were large and hairy, clamping over his nose and mouth, and for a second, Eijun's senses deserted him, as he wondered what was going on. Then the hands tightened around his face, and as he realized that he couldn't breathe, his senses returned. He immediately began to struggle wildly.

_I don't want to die!_, he screamed silently, clawing and trying to bite at the hands. But they didn't let go. Oxygen-deprived, he could feel himself losing consciousness. His lungs were screaming at him. His head and heart pounded in his ears.

Just before Eijun thought he would explode, there was a grunting sound. The hands holding his face tightly slackened. Eijun fell to his knees, coughing, crying, the cold brutal oxygen sucking painfully into his lungs.

When he'd finally calmed down, he turned to see his assailant lying very still on the ground. His face was hidden from him. The area around his neck was bright red, standing out sharply from the gathered white snow.

Standing beside the body was the captain, looking down at him very quietly. His blade was drawn, its end sticky with blood.

"Can you get up on your own?" said the captain. Eijun mutely nodded. "Very well." He returned the blade to its sheath and left.

Eijun shakily got to his feet. He hesitated. He didn't want to see it. But nevertheless, he limped over and turned over his assailant's head to look at his face.

He was one of the men that Eijun had seen every now and then at the marketplace when he tagged along with his parents. They had never talked before, and for that one little mercy, Eijun felt grateful.

He delivered the rest of the morning newspapers before going back home.

* * *

Several days later, Eijun was still huddled in a futon when his mother suddenly slid open his room's door with an uncertain look on her face.

"Eijun," she said. "The...the captain is here to see you."

Eijun shot to his feet, his eyes widening. But before he could even take a step, the door slid further open to reveal Captain Miyuki himself. For the first time, Eijun noticed, he wasn't wearing either the officer's uniform or the baseball uniform. He was dressed soberly in a grey, unassuming suit.

The captain's eyes raked over his room before coming to a rest on his figure, and Eijun felt his cheeks go warm, knowing what a sight he must make. He hadn't washed in several days and his hair was mussed, his clothes wrinkled and threadbare. His room too was a mess, and if he sniffed, he thought he could smell mold. The captain on the other hand, made a striking figure even in a civilian suit, all sharp angles and cuts.

"Could you spare me an hour of your time, Eijun?" Captain Miyuki asked him, and he stammered out a yes. Pausing to hurriedly put on a jacket and a scarf, he followed the man outside his house.

It was snowing outside again. It fell slowly, covering the empty paddies around his house in white. For several minutes, they steadily walked in silence on one of the paths that led through the field.

"I am going to be re-assigned soon," the captain suddenly said. "To the frontlines in China."

"Yes, captain," said Eijun, wondering why he was being told this.

"I came here to tell you a story," he said, as if reading Eijun's thoughts. "But before I tell you it, I have a favor to ask of you."

"A favor, sir?"

"A request."

"Yes, sir."

"Very well. Here it is, then: I want you to give me your complete honest opinion on the man whose story I am about to tell you. How does that sound?"

"Y...yes sir," said Eijun hesitantly.

"Right," said the captain, nodding. "Then here it is."

* * *

The man I am speaking of was the second son of a prominent family in Japan. He grew up without lacking for anything. Money, education, social status...the entire world lay bare at his feet. He was intelligent and quick on his feet, and he was the most popular boy in school. Girls fawned over him. Boys clustered around him, seeking his attention. Teachers adored him. You know the usual tripe.

The only person who could objectively be compared with him and come out on top – at least in this man's point of view – was his older brother. He was only a year older than this man, but somehow, he was always several steps ahead. At the same time the man thought of building a bridge, this man's brother would already be hammering the last nail into the finished bridge. But unlike this man, the man's brother cared little about money or social status. He could easily have beaten out the man to be the most popular boy in school, but he had little interest in such things.

The brothers got along, regardless, but they had very few things in common. The one thing they had in common, in fact, was their mutual love for baseball. They even played the same position – catcher. They each formed their own baseball teams and often played games with one another.

After some time, however, the man grew frustrated. It seemed that no matter how hard he and his team trained, they could never beat his brother's team. It seemed that his brother was simply more talented than him as a catcher, and was able to out-read anything he tried. But nevertheless, the man loved his brother too much to hate him for this.

Upon graduating high school, both brothers joined the imperial army, following in their father's footsteps. They were both immediately recognized, both for their social status and for their talents, and were rapidly promoted to a commanding officer's position.

Along with their units, they were both assigned to a foreign post alongside a celebrated colonel, when something terrible happened. A band of rebels that had been acting as a menace in that region was caught and brought in for questioning.

Torture wasn't working, however. They were tough men and women. They didn't make a single noise when their fingernails were ripped out. The toughest of them was a woman, maybe in her thirties. She was a proud one. When they pressed a molten metal cylinder against her foot, she asked them if they could get her a glass of water because it was starting to get hot.

So finally, they brought in some of the children that they'd found at the rebels' hideout. They threatened to kill the children in front of the rebels if they didn't talk. They grew pale then, but their mouths remained resolutely stiff.

"Kill one," said the colonel, nodding at the man's brother. The brother grew very still.

"I can't, sir," he replied.

"That's an order from your superior officer, lieutenant," said the colonel warningly.

"I can't, sir," said the man's brother.

"That's an _**order**_."

"I can't, sir."

The colonel grew very quiet. He suddenly reached for the blade in his sheath, and drew it in a single movement. He pointed it at the man's brother, who also grew pale but didn't move. Everyone in the room froze and watched them. Even the children.

The man then drew his own blade, and stabbed it through the heart of the nearest child. A young girl with short black hair and freckles. She fell to the ground, and the rebel woman, the toughest one of them all, fainted at the sight.

This satisfied the colonel, and he returned his sword to his side.

"Very good, lieutenant," he praised him. "I'll be sure to put in a good word for you at the capital."

And he was true to his word. He put in a good word for the man, embellishing his actions in battle, and he was promoted to the rank of captain. At his request, they even gave him a short vacation, letting him stay at a small, peaceful backwater place, away from the heat of battle, for some time.

* * *

"And that's the story," said the captain, ending his tale abruptly. He stopped walking, his hands folded behind him as he looked out at the white field. "Now, I have a question for you. Did the man kill the child because he loved his brother? Or did he kill the child because it was the one time he would be able to outshine his brother?"

Eijun hesitated, before answering, "I think only the man himself could know that."

"Very good," said the captain, his face twisting into a wry smile. "Very good. Now here's the real question. What is your opinion on this man?"

For a while, Eijun didn't answer. He looked down at his feet instead, thinking.

Thinking.

He looked up, and saw that the captain was looking back at Eijun with a fierce expression on his face. It was the usual look he wore, but for the first time, Eijun thought he could sense something brittle like glass lurking beneath.

_I could shatter him with a single blow_, Eijun thought to himself in wonder. _With a single word. Like the way he said 'fire!'_

He opened his mouth – and then closed it.

Gleaming rifles. Gleaming needles. Gleaming swords.

How had they come to this moment? How did he hold such power over the captain? How did the captain hold such power over him?

"I think he must still be playing baseball in whatever backwater place he ended up in," Eijun finally said.

The captain's mouth dropped open. He blinked at him. And then rearing his head back, he let out a roar of laughter. The moment was broken, then. The fragility was completely gone again. He was all sharp angles and cuts again. With a smile back on his face, Captain Miyuki thumped Eijun on the back.

"We'll play baseball together again, one day," he said lightly. "We made a good battery, partner."

The snow was starting to pick up, so they walked back to Eijun's house in silence. The captain left soon afterward, his grey back fading into the white horizon, and Eijun never saw him again.

* * *

Captain Miyuki was replaced by an older man with a beer belly who barked orders and never stepped foot on the field behind the station. The ragtag baseball team scattered, and many of the younger officers returned to Japan or were sent to another post.

Time passed, and memories faded. The red stain on the floor of the town center was covered up with paint. The beatings at school stopped. His father recovered, and life returned to something that could have passed as normal.

Eijun wondered every now and then where the captain could have gone.

News trickled in of the Japanese army's conquests abroad. Hundreds of thousands of innocent Chinese were slaughtered in the Nanking massacre, people said. Maybe even millions. Men, women, and children alike hacked to pieces by Japanese soldiers. Men, women, and children alike raped on their own doorsteps by Japanese soldiers.

Some of those soldiers must have loved baseball too. They must have played baseball on a baseball diamond. Maybe even as a catcher, or as a pitcher. How could men who loved baseball kill someone?

But it did happen, and Eijun wondered if Miyuki Kazuya was among them.

"_We'll play baseball together again, one day._"

He visited the field every now and then, though it was getting harder to move around freely nowadays. It seemed that the war effort abroad wasn't going as well, for they'd clamped down on their rule and had started to actually enforce the laws. He'd recently had to start working at the factory, helping add to the belching smokestacks as they churned out supplies for the army. His whole body hurt.

The field was slowly disappearing, being taken over by weeds. One day, it would be completely gone.


	2. The Orphan

**The Orphan**

* * *

The world had become a very different place by the time Miyuki Kazuya returned to it.

Years ago, when they'd ripped the burlap bag from his head and shoved him down onto the grimy floor of a cell, he had thought he would never again see the light of day. But somehow, bleary-eyed and with a face itching with stubble, Kazuya now sat in the seat of a train headed to the outskirts of some displaced prefecture.

The train clattered around him. Civilians chattered to each other in the seats in front and behind him. They were speaking of everyday things—things he hadn't thought about or considered in a very long time.

"Have you seen the results of the game between the Giants and the Dragons yet?"

"No! I haven't managed to get my hands on the morning paper yet. Have you?"

"Would you look at what Murata-san is wearing today?"

"I was at Sato's house last night."

"You watched the broadcast then?"

"Kiyo-chan wasn't feeling well, so we had to leave her with my parents…"

"We were all crowded into his living room to watch it. It was an amazing game."

"Takashi-kun! Come back here!"

Something tugged on Kazuya's sleeve. Looking down, he met the widened eyes of a round-faced boy dressed neatly in a jumpsuit.

"Mister, what happened to your hand?" asked the boy, pointing with a chubby finger.

Kazuya pulled his sleeve back, revealing his blackened, ruined hand. "Well, I was a naughty child, you see. The ogres got to me."

The boy's mouth dropped open in awe. "Wow!"

Just then, squeezing past a group of suited men, the boy's mother burst into the aisle. "Takashi-kun, what are you doing?! I told you not to talk to strangers!"

"Yes mama," said the boy, pouting. Taking his mother's waiting hand, he let himself be led away.

After a moment, Kazuya lowered his hand. Tucking it into the folds of his jacket, he leaned back against his seat and looked out the window. The scenery passed by quickly. The green stalks of rice fields waved, with flashes of water here and there. He could make out small figures in the distance. Their bamboo hats shone white in the sunlight.

He and the other prisoners of war who'd been repatriated from China had been met with a small, cheering crowd of people at the harbor. They'd waved flags as they each stumbled off the ship plank. Kazuya could clearly remember the moment. The sun rays, dazzling to his gaunt eyes. The smiling faces with features like his own. The familiar sight of the snow white flag with the red sun.

There'd been no one waiting for Kazuya. At the town hall, he found a message his uncle had left for him.

His parents had perished in Tokyo during an air raid. Their estate had burned down with them. His older brother had been killed in action over ten years ago. Thinking that Kazuya too was dead, his uncle had taken over the helm of the family.

Now that he was back, the family didn't know what to do with him. In the end, under the pretense of rehabilitation, Kazuya found himself being shuttled off to a countryside summer house.

He may have once protested against it. Back in the days when he'd been Captain Miyuki, esteemed officer of the Imperial Japanese Army. Back when he'd had a brother. But the army was dismantled, the war lost. His brother's ashes had long since been scattered to the wind.

So why was he still alive?, he wondered.

* * *

Out in the rather vaguely-termed countryside, his days passed as idly as one might expect from the second son of a wealthy Tokyo family.

His abode was a small, traditional-style building with tatami flooring and sliding doors. A home that he'd only spent time in once as a young boy, it was grounded and soberly furnished. The most lavish decoration was an ornamental sword—a purported heirloom—hanging above the mantle in the entryway.

There was also a study room with a window that looked outside, and a scroll hanging in the alcove. Kazuya spent the first few weeks in there, pretending to preoccupy himself by reading through papers his uncle had sent him. Hundreds of financial and legal documents, listing so many things and yet at the same time, nothing at all. Using his left hand, he scrawled his signature across these papers in child-like handwriting.

One morning, he found himself staring down at a paragraph halfway through a thick bundle of papers with zero recollection of what he'd just read through. After a beat, he threw down his felt-tipped pen. He pushed the tower of papers off his desk, and watched with empty satisfaction as the white papers scattered in the air, tumbling down to the floor.

His uncle had yet to send any further notice since. Kazuya didn't expect to hear anything from the city for a very long time.

* * *

The window of his study looked out over a small vegetable garden.

When Kazuya had first arrived, there'd been only rows of raked dirt. Now however, tufts of leafy greens dotted the earth. When he'd asked, the housekeeper—a middle-aged woman who was rarely seen without a gardening tool at hand—told him that she'd planted cucumber, squash, eggplant, and a few vines of tomato entwined around a wire cage in the sun-lit corner.

Sometimes, he saw the figure of a young boy working in the garden beside her. He wore a little straw hat, and judging from his size, he couldn't have been more than eight, nine years old. When Kazuya first saw the child, he wondered whether it was the housekeeper's son. The next time he ventured outside, he asked her in a passing sort of way.

"Do you have a son, Takigawa-san?"

The trowel in her hand paused. "No, I don't."

But Kazuya had already lost interest before he'd even heard her answer. Without pressing the subject, he wandered away and then spent the rest of the day sleeping atop the sloping hill. There was an old willow tree there that blocked most of the sunlight.

Sometimes, when he'd been lying there long enough, he thought he could make out something like mist drifting off the trunk of the tree. Something faint whispered in his ear.

Aside from the housekeeper and the boy who wasn't her son, there was only a maid who came to clean the villa once every week. When evening fell, Kazuya was the only person around for as far as the eye could see.

When he was awake, his head was filled with hundreds of voices. Brusque men shouting at him in languages he didn't understand. Terrified women pleading toward him in languages he didn't understand. Crying and screaming, though, were universal.

But when Kazuya was asleep, there was nothing. No voices. No throbbing ache where his hand was once whole. There was nothing but silence, as absolute as the orders of a superior officer and as still as the dirt pile by a a freshly-dug hole.

* * *

Kazuya first met the boy on a particularly heated day. It was the kind when the passing breeze was thick and suffocating. His feet, partially out in the sun, were prickling. He opened his eyes and as his vision adjusted to the sudden light, he could make out a small dark figure sitting by the tree roots.

By simple process of elimination, Kazuya knew it was the boy who sometimes worked in the garden, though he wasn't wearing his straw hat. As his eyes refocused, he saw that the boy was looking at something on the tree's trunk through what looked to be a magnifying glass.

"Hello there," Kazuya called out.

At the sound of his voice, the boy momentarily looked up with a blank expression, and Kazuya saw his face for the first time.

Immediately, Kazuya knew—the boy wasn't Japanese. Or at least, not fully. His nose was just a bit too tall, his face just a bit too defined. His hair was a shade of lighter brown. But it was his eyes that really gave him away. They were yellow. Or were they amber? It was hard to say. Whatever the color however, it was foreign.

Without responding, the boy turned back to his magnifying glass. Somewhat bemused, Kazuya picked himself up. Brushing off stray blades of grass and dirt from his kimono, he approached the boy.

"What's your name?" he asked. There was no response. "Do you speak Japanese?" Now that he was closer, Kazuya could see what the boy was doing: If the shriveled black ant bodies were any indication, it looked as though he was burning ants on the tree trunk. "I've seen you working in the garden with Takigawa-san."

"I'm not supposed to talk to you," the boy answered in perfect Japanese. "Auntie said so."

He smiled. "Is your aunt Takigawa-san?" The boy shrugged, focusing his attention on another hapless ant that tried to scuttle away. "Well, your aunt works for me. And I say you can talk to me." That gave the boy some pause. Kazuya watched as the ant, taking advantage of its lucky break, disappeared into a knot in the tree. The boy turned. There was a purpling bruise on his brow, Kazuya suddenly noticed.

His eyes shining strangely in the sunlight, the boy said, "I'm Eijun."

Wind, blowing through the hanging branches. Sunlight, filtering down through the leaves over them. A whisper in his ear. His throbbing hand, tucked uselessly away in the folds of his sleeve. Kazuya couldn't move.

* * *

As he would soon find out from the reluctant housekeeper, the boy was what they called a half. He was the product of an ill-fated encounter between one of the American soldiers occupying Japan, and a young Japanese girl. She'd been swept off her feet by promises murmured in a language she didn't understand. Inevitably perhaps, the soldier returned to his own country shortly after she gave birth. A few years later, the woman's sister—the housekeeper—found the boy abandoned at her doorstep. The mother hadn't shown her face since.

"He's a problematic boy," the housekeeper said shortly, wiping her brow with a towel. "Always getting in trouble at school."

"There's a school around here?" he asked.

"Just a small one, a few miles out," she said, gesturing vaguely to the horizon. "Not many families with children around here." She peered suspiciously at him, her eyes straying to his blackened hand. "Is there any reason why you're asking me these questions?"

Kazuya reassured her that no, he wasn't a xenophobe nor a pedophile. He was just a harmless—albeit bored—man enjoying his leisurely days of early retirement.

"Auntie said you're a war crim…crimnal," said Eijun matter-of-factly the next time they met. They were sitting under the willow tree. Thankfully, the boy hadn't brought his magnifying glass this time.

"…did she now?" said Kazuya. Without responding, Eijun eyed him in a way reminiscent of the housekeeper. Sighing, Kazuya handed the boy another piece of candy from his pocket.

Unwrapping the candy with some relish, Eijun nodded. "But uncle got mad at her for saying that. He said that Japan shoulda won the war. And that the, the soldiers are all heroes." He popped the candy in his mouth, and Kazuya noticed a gap in his teeth that hadn't been there before.

"…Haha! I see." He gave the boy a small smile. "Well, what about you, Eijun? What do you think of me?"

One cheek bulging with candy, Eijun kicked carelessly at the dirt. "I dunno." Twisting around, he tugged at Kazuya's sleeve. "Hey, what happened to your hand, mister?"

Pulling back his sleeve, Kazuya paused. He'd always planned on using his ogre story when asked, as more likely than not, children would be the only ones honest enough to ask. For some reason however, he couldn't bring himself to tell it this time. "Well…you see, this is what happens to bad people when they get caught."

But Eijun only shrugged. "Oh, okay." Then, presumably catching sight of something more interesting, he got to his feet and trotted away. He left behind just two sticky wrappers.

* * *

He didn't dream.

But when he drifted off to sleep under the willow tree, sometimes he caught snatches of something that lay in between reality and unreality. It whispered in his ears. It hovered around him like an apparition.

_It was the middle of summer, but in his eyes, he could see a field of snow. Everywhere, it was white—except for a pool of red right at his feet._

_His sword was drawn. Dark blood dripped off its end. There was a body, still and silenced. And just beyond that, another body—but this one was trembling. His shoulders were heaving. The boy was alive._

_Why did that bring such immense relief?_

"_Can you get up on your own?" he asked._

His eyes slowly opened. And like mist dissipating into air, the snow disappeared. It was summer again. He was alone again. At his side, his hand dully throbbed.

* * *

Waving goodbye to the farmer who'd hitched him a ride to the nearest town, Kazuya was heading back to the house when he saw Eijun walking ahead on the dirt road. In a disheveled school uniform, his head was bowed. He moved with a slow, careful gait.

Making sure that his bag of new books was secured to his side, Kazuya picked up his pace. The boy lifted his head at the sound of approaching footsteps, but when he saw Kazuya, it slinked back down.

"Hello Eijun," said Kazuya cheerily. "Heading back home from school?" Eijun jerked his head. "What'd you learn today?" He shrugged. "Hm. Well, do you like school?"

"No," the boy answered shortly.

"Why not?"

"Because."

"Because why?"

"Because, because."

Kazuya decided it was time to change the subject. He patted his bulging bag. "Do you like to read?"

"No."

And so on and so forth.

* * *

One evening, there was a summer festival in the next town over. Kazuya followed the housekeeper and her husband to the venue.

Paper lanterns hung from lines strung all around the town center. Conversations buzzed everywhere as children darted around and under yukata robes. Sizzling and smoke wafted from stalls. The smell of okonomiyaki and takoyaki filled the air. It was almost unbearably hot, a mix of body heat and summer haze. The ground and air vibrated with the rumbling sound of taiko drums.

Kazuya could remember a festival just like this one, long ago. Back when he'd visited this area with his family as a child, they'd also visited a festival. Perhaps it had been this very same one.

The housekeeper having excused herself to look for her nephew, Kazuya found himself walking past the stalls alone.

"Where'd you get _that_ from?"

"C'mon, keep up!"

"Wait for me!"

"I'll give you two of these for that…"

His feet stopped in front of the goldfish scooping stall. There were already several children squatted in front of the tank, fervently following the darting fish with their paddles.

"Sacchan, how many do you have?"

"None, yet. Why?"

"I've got three. Here, you can have one."

Kazuya could remember squatting in front of the tank as a boy, eyes focused as he tried to outmaneuver the elusive fish. He'd tried to catch more than his brother. Back in the day, that'd been his primary preoccupation: beating his older brother.

Of course however, his brother had caught a number more than Kazuya. He thought he could recall spending the rest of the evening sulking over that.

All of a sudden, a stinging pain seared through his right hand. Taken off-guard, Kazuya stumbled. He managed to catch himself in time. But as he straightened up, he caught sight of a passing woman. Giving him an odd look, she ushered her son closer to her body. Automatically, Kazuya drew his hand further back into his sleeve. He turned his back on the stall, and began to walk in the other direction.

The festival lights faded at his back and his surroundings grew dark. But he didn't stop. At least, not until the heat had given way to a cool summer wind that nipped at his bare arms. When he finally turned around, he'd gone far enough that the darkness was like a tunnel. At the other end was a cluster of orange festival lights, bobbing in a way that made them look ghostly. Like they were floating in midair.

* * *

"What're you staring at me for?" Eijun mumbled. He looked embarrassed to be the subject of attention. Unsettled, even. His small body was tense and poised, as though prepared to take flight at the slightest warning sign.

They were weeding the garden again. Going against the housekeeper's protests, it had initially been a somewhat interesting and even satisfying hobby for Kazuya. It'd been a sort of a challenge to himself, trying to do it one-handed. It was easier than it'd seemed however—the trick was to pull out the shallow-rooted ones before they seeded. Once he'd realized that, the task had been consigned to the chore that it was.

He wondered, just how did they keep growing back? Even when it seemed they'd pulled out every single weed possible, in a few days, there would surely be several more peeking out of the earth. Obako, quickweed, daisies, and others he didn't recognize. But still, it gave him something to do. And it passed the hours.

"You remind me a little of someone I once knew long ago," Kazuya finally replied.

"Me?" Eijun frowned. He wiped at his face with his shoulder, leaving behind a smudge of dirt. "Were they also a half?"

"No, he was…" Kazuya stopped. He thought about it. In the ensuing silence, Eijun looked toward him curiously. Under the sunlight, his strange golden eyes seemed to glow. Finally, he answered, "Well, maybe he was, in a way."

"What's that supposed to mean?" the boy mumbled, looking away.

"Never mind," he said with a smile. "Anyways, Eijun, what do you like to do?"

"…not weed gardens."

"Haha! Me neither. Hm. Do you play any sports?"

"No."

"Do you _like_ any sports? Baseball?"

"Baseball is boring."

Kazuya blinked—and then he let out a sigh. "Is that so?"

"Why? Do _you_ like baseball?" asked Eijun, hacking at a root with a trowel.

"Yes," he answered. Feeling tired, he left it at that. They conducted the rest of their weeding session in silence.

* * *

Rainy season had begun. The air was tepid, the atmosphere brimming with grey clouds. Warm raindrops, pitter pattering on the roof. Kazuya didn't leave the house when it was raining.

They said ghosts dwelled within willow trees.

What did they do, he wondered, when there was nobody living around them to haunt? Did they disappear?

"_You there," he called out, pointing at the boy holding the baseball. "What's your name?"_

_The boy blanched, as they all did when he pointed at them. But he didn't withdraw into himself like most of them did. A beat passed, and then his face smoothening over, he rallied himself together. The boy was a brave one. He could tell._

"…_, sir," the boy replied._

_What was the boy's name? He couldn't recall. Even though it'd been only a little different from the name he knew him by. But it seemed that little difference was enough to make it unintelligible._

"_Have you ever played baseball?"_

He opened his eyes. The ceiling, at first blurry, came into focus. The roof must have leaked, for something warm and wet was dripping down his face. As always, his hand ached.

* * *

News for Kazuya came from the city sooner than he'd expected. And what he received was different from anything he'd been expecting.

His uncle was dead. He'd been taken by radiation sickness. It had struck and carried the man away before anyone had even thought to notify Kazuya.

As he prepared his funeral clothes in his study, he felt a faint nearby presence. Kazuya turned around to see, indeed, a pair of tawny eyes observing him from the window.

"Where're you going?" asked Eijun in a suspicious tone.

"The city," said Kazuya, turning back to his opened drawers.

There was a pause. "You're leaving?"

"Hm? What's that?" he said, smiling. "Think you'll miss me?"

"Ha!"

Kazuya blinked, and looked back to see the boy scowling heavily. He'd recently added a jagged cut by his mouth to his collection of injuries, which added to the effect. "…is that a no?"

His mouth still sticky with candy, Eijun stuck his tongue out. "Leave and don't come back for all I care!" Without waiting for a response, he scurried away.

* * *

The way the smoke of the incense filled his nose and ears raised unpleasant memories for Kazuya. The first chance he got, he stepped out onto the veranda. He breathed in the fresh air so deeply, his lungs rattled.

"Mister, what happened to your hand?"

Kazuya looked down to see a tiny girl with freckles. Perhaps one of his cousin's daughters? He pulled his sleeve back, revealing his blackened, ruined hand. "Well, I was too much of a naughty child. The ogres got to me."

The girl let out a little gasp. Her mouth forming a perfect circle, she got up and ran away to one of the women dressed in black. Hiding behind her mother's kimono, she peeked at Kazuya. One of the men who'd been talking with the woman noticed, and looked in Kazuya's direction. His eyes widened in recognition. Kazuya let out an internal sigh, waiting for the inevitable.

Excusing himself, the man began to walk over.

* * *

For some time after he'd returned to the countryside, Kazuya didn't see Eijun.

At first, he thought nothing of it. He simply kept an eye out for the straw hat in the garden. But after a few days, finding himself counting the number of threads in the tatami floor, Kazuya finally gave in.

"The boy?" The housekeeper eyed Kazuya suspiciously. "He's always doing whatever he wants. He'll show up when he feels like it."

And indeed, several days after that, he woke up from his customary afternoon nap under the willow tree to see Eijun standing over him. He was holding a magnifying glass and burning ants again. This time however, on Kazuya's leg, which would explain the prickliness.

"Did you know ants have two stomachs?" Kazuya said. He'd recently read about it in one of the books he'd picked up in town.

"Huh?"

"They've got one stomach to hold food for themselves, and then another for other ants."

There was a short pause as Eijun, with his brow furrowed, visually processed this information. "But…why?"

"Why what?"

"Why…why would they need another for other ants? Can't the other ants feed themselves?"

"It's because some ants need to look after their nest while other ants look for food."

Eijun fell silent. He looked down at the magnifying glass in his hand. For a second, Kazuya wondered… but then without further response, the boy bent over the glass and began to focus sunlight over another ant. This time, on his ankle.

Kazuya let his head fall back on the grass.

How ironic, he thought. How sickening. That he of all people could feel this sorry for an ant.

* * *

On one particularly slow afternoon, Kazuya was about a quarter of the way into _Birds of the Old World_ and was musing about the impracticalities of importing flamingos—when he heard a clattering sound. And then, high-pitched, unbridled shouting.

Anger was an ugly sound. He hadn't heard it rear its ugly head in some time. It was a jarring realization. A break in the blanket of stagnant serenity he'd managed to wrap himself in.

At first stunned, as the shouts continued, he was pushed into action. Dropping his book, he hurried to his window. As he'd been able to surmise, the one who was screaming was the housekeeper. And standing several feet away from her, trembling, was the target of her fury. A small trembling figure…

In an instant, everything turned white for Kazuya. At first, it all the blood and heat in his body seemed to rush to his head. To the point where he wondered whether he wouldn't internally combust. Whether his body wouldn't burn white and crumble into dust and smoke.

But then as quickly as he'd burned hot, everything turned cold. It felt like something had sucked out all the heat of his body. His surroundings were in icy clarity. All of a sudden, he could make out details in the room around him that he'd never noticed before, from the faint scrawling in the corner (a child's handwriting?) to the slightly uneven touch-up of the wooden window frame (had there been a nick there?).

His heart had slowed down. It was so slow, he wondered in a detached sort of way whether he hadn't died. Was he a ghost now?

Silently leaving his room, Kazuya reached the main entryway. As he slipped his feet into his sandals, he could still hear her screaming. Without the slightest hesitation, he lifted the ornamental blade above the mantel from its hooks. He slid the door open. It had just started to rain again, but he paid it no mind.

Droplets of rain hit his stiff face. The woman's back was to Kazuya. He was walking so quietly, she couldn't have hoped to hear him. As he drew closer to the two figures, everything was so clear, so clear, he couldn't make sense of her words. The only thing he knew was that the boy was trembling. And that he would do anything to stop those tremors.

It was only as Kazuya lifted the blade in his hand that he caught sight of Eijun's expression. The boy's face—bruised and bleeding from his mouth and nose—was taut with fear. And yet, for some reason, it wasn't fear for himself. His eyes flickered to the screaming woman, and then to the blade. His eyes were pleading. Kazuya knew that look well.

It had never stopped him before, but just this once, it gave him pause. And finally, in that still moment as the soft sound of rain hitting the earth filled his ears, the housekeeper's words registered in his mind.

"What is this, Ei-chan?! Who did this?!" the woman cried.

Eijun didn't respond. His amber eyes, unblinking, bore into Kazuya's. The rain, dyed red by his blood, streamed down his face.

"Why don't you ever tell me?!" she said, keening. Her shoulders were shaking. "If you'd just tell me who did this, I'd find them! If only you'd tell me!"

His hold on the hilt slackening, Kazuya lowered the sword. Seeing that, Eijun's frame sagged in relief. His expression crumbled.

"How could I?" the boy answered, his voice quivering. "How could I?"

"You just need to tell me," said the woman. She was pleading too, now. "Then I can help you."

Thick tears began to well up in Eijun's eyes. "Then…then you'd get tired of me too. You'd leave me too."

Something was burning. Something was searing. His surroundings were spinning.

Kazuya looked down—and realized that he was gripping the hilt with his right hand. The hand that had been blackened and ruined in a prison camp thousands of miles away in foreign country. The hand that he'd thought had died on the day he'd stabbed a young girl. The day his brother had looked at him as though he were a stranger.

Forcing open his hand, he released the sword. It clattered to the ground.

* * *

_Kazuya nodded carelessly. "Very good. Now here's the real question. What is your opinion on this man?"_

_A long pause. The boy looked down at his feet. Kazuya had noticed that he'd never really met his eyes, not even when looking for a sign from the mound._

_Why did he care what this boy thought? This foreign boy who'd grown up in the boonies. This insignificant nobody who knew nothing._

_And yet, how had they come to this moment?_

_Said boy suddenly looked up. And for the first time, he looked straight at Kazuya. "I think he must still be playing baseball in whatever backwater place he ended up in."_

_He gaped at that. And then he laughed. Oh, he laughed._

_When he could finally speak again, he smiled at the boy. "We'll play baseball together again, one day."_

Regaining consciousness, Kazuya found himself lying on his futon. There was something light weighing down on his arm. He turned to see a small figure with tufts of brown hair dozing beside him. His hand throbbed, as it always would.

Something wet was trickling down his face. And he couldn't even blame the roof this time. Just the week before, he'd had a worker come in to fix the leaks.

* * *

"You're really going to leave this time, aren't you?" Eijun said, biting his lip.

Kazuya reached out with a hand to ruffle the boy's hair. "I have to take care of some family affairs."

For the first time in a long while, he was wearing a suit again. He'd always worn a kimono around the house. The grey business suit he now wore felt constricting in comparison. Still, formality was formality. And perhaps constraints, as binding as they were, weren't always a bad thing.

"Then...will you come back after that?"

"Of course," he said. Of course.

"Okay. I'll play some baseball with you when you do," Eijun mumbled, his cheeks glowing pink. "Even though it's boring."

Kazuya smiled. "Then I'd better return."

He looked down at his watch. There was still some time before the car to take him to the train station would get here.

Kazuya picked his way through the grass to the top of the hill, where the willow tree was waiting. Setting his briefcase down on the ground, he sat down.

From here too, he could see the vegetable garden. Takigawa-san had done her job well. The garden, small as it was, was overflowing with greens and dotted with color. In the corner, fat red tomatoes were bulging off of vines that snaked up the wire mesh.

The sound of laughter caught his attention. Kazuya turned to see Eijun huddled by the willow tree. Takigawa-san had taken Eijun out of the school for now. It was only a temporary solution. But the boy's bruises were finally starting to fade.

At the moment, he was breaking up a cucumber and dropping the bits on the ground by the tree roots. After a few seconds, Kazuya saw the source of his mirth: ants were crawling around the bits, and carrying them up the trunk of the tree.

("Did you know ants can carry up to fifty times their body weight?" said the boy excitedly.)

There was something on the trunk, Kazuya realized. A faint smear of something white. Had paint somehow gotten on there before? He couldn't tell. But maybe it'd been the source of the mist he thought he'd seen around it. An afterimage created by some strange inflection of the light, perhaps.

As he looked at it, a memory of a baseball field he'd once played on drifted into his mind. It'd been far away, in a foreign land. From what he could recall, it'd been a crudely-made field, with bases painted in white at each corner. He'd played as a catcher there, for a boy who'd looked at him in a way no one else ever had. Was it still there, he wondered?

Probably not. By this point, it was most likely nothing but a lot full of weeds. He could see it in his mind. Daisies, scattered here and there, their white faces swaying in the far-off breeze. Unwanted, perhaps, to some. Yet even weeds had their places. And no doubt, they'd be sprouting there long after he'd disappeared from the face of the earth.

Lying back on the grass—not caring at the moment whether it'd ruin his suit—Kazuya closed his eyes.

The sunlight, filtering through the branches in patches, was warm on his skin. The wind pushed at his face and hair. The smell of grass was thick. He could feel his heart beating steadily in his chest. He could hear laughter again.

The world had become a very different place. But it was still the same as ever.

As he lay there, somewhere in the distance, he thought he could hear the clanging of metal bats. Baseballs colliding into his mitt. The crunching of running footsteps on dirt. Laughter and squabbling. His brother's voice, gently teasing, the way it once had long ago.

And even further away—but at the same time, reverberating within his chest—a quiet whisper. So quiet it could've belonged to a ghost. It haunted him.

It called to him.

"Stay with me," he said. Opening his eyes, he got up.


End file.
